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Understanding collective behaviour is an important aspect of managing the pandemic response. Here the authors show in a large global study that participants that reported identifying more strongly with their nation reported greater engagement in public health behaviours and support for public health policies in the context of the pandemic.

Airy beams are promising for applications requiring sharp focusing but have so far been realized in only two dimensions. Now their extension to three dimensions exhibits superior spatiotemporal focusing dynamics than Gaussian beams.

Anaerobic methane-oxidizing archaea mitigate methane emissions in anoxic environments. Here, Egas et al. show that these microbes can also oxidize carbon monoxide, prompting re-evaluation of their classification as obligate methanotrophs and their role in methane mitigation.

An analysis of 24,202 critical cases of COVID-19 identifies potentially druggable targets in inflammatory signalling (JAK1), monocyte–macrophage activation and endothelial permeability (PDE4A), immunometabolism (SLC2A5 and AK5), and host factors required for viral entry and replication (TMPRSS2 and RAB2A).

Whole-genome sequencing, transcriptome-wide association and fine-mapping analyses in over 7,000 individuals with critical COVID-19 are used to identify 16 independent variants that are associated with severe illness in COVID-19.

The authors show that plasma AT(N) biomarkers can distinguish Alzheimer’s disease and frontotemporal lobar degeneration in diverse Latin American populations. Using machine learning and integrating neuroimaging, significant diagnostic accuracy was achieved, enhancing clinical assessments of these conditions in Latin America.

Concerns over health misinformation online are becoming increasingly important. Here the authors show that older adults are more likely than younger people to encounter low-credibility health information online. Although exposure is limited overall, it is highest among those who already believe inaccurate health claims.

A global synthesis of >600 studies finds that across agro-ecosystems, grasslands and forests in temperate and tropical zones, increasing plant diversity has a consistently positive effect on plant performance and the suppression of antagonists.

Commercial solutions to assess air quality and safety in underground mines often suffer from low accuracy, high installation and maintenance costs, without providing data on noxious gases. Here, the authors present a wireless, battery-free sensing platform for environmental monitoring of underground mines.

How reduced blood flow plays a role in progressive white matter loss during aging and associated cognitive decline is unclear. Here the authors show that selective constriction and rarefaction of capillary–venous networks contribute to age-related hypoperfusion and white matter damage in mice.

Availability of computing power can limit computational analysis of large genetic and genomic datasets. Here, Canela-Xandri, et al. describe a software called DISSECT that is capable of analyzing large-scale genetic data by distributing the work across thousands of networked computers.

The flagship paper of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes Consortium describes the generation of the integrative analyses of 2,658 cancer whole genomes and their matching normal tissues across 38 tumour types, the structures for international data sharing and standardized analyses, and the main scientific findings from across the consortium studies.

The authors showcase a spatiotemporal holographic method that can arbitrarily sculpt spatiotemporal light by generating various spatiotemporal wavepackets. The ability to deploy these fully customizable wavepackets opens up exciting avenues for their use in broader applications.

Compared to the oxygenation of Earth’s atmosphere, little is known about the build up of dissolved oxygen in the oceans. Vanadium isotopes in shales suggest shallow oceans equilibrated with a newly oxygenated atmosphere in just a few million years.

Traditionally, ozone has been primarily used to oxidatively deconstruct carbon–carbon bonds. Now, it has been shown that ozone can be used for the construction of carbon–oxygen bonds without oxidative cleavage of the olefin substrate through capturing primary ozonides. Furthermore, intercepting primary ozonides with nucleophiles in continuous flow enabled the green, syn-dihydroxylation of olefins to be realized.

Dissolved oxygen levels in the Proterozoic surface ocean decreased from the Equator towards the mid–high latitudes, the opposite of the modern latitudinal gradient, according to a compilation of I/Ca proxy records and Earth system modelling.

Plant RNA Pol V is involved in the RNA-directed DNA-methylation pathway that leads to heterochromatic silencing at some endogenous loci. Now the genomic regions targeted by Pol V in Arabidopsis thaliana are determined by ChIP-seq analyses revealing Pol V's enrichment at evolutionarily recent transposons.

Humanity’s Last Exam, a multi-modal benchmark at the frontier of human knowledge, is designed to be an expert-level closed-ended academic benchmark with broad subject coverage.

In an updated report on 70 laboratory-confirmed highly pathogenic avian influenza A H5N1 cases in the USA between March 2024 and May 2025, the absence of human-to-human transmission to date was confirmed, with no known mutations of resistance to neuroaminidase inhibitors.

JWST/NIRSpec observations of Abell2744-QSO1 show a high black-hole-to-host mass ratio in the early Universe, which indicates that we are seeing the black hole in a phase of rapid growth, accreting at 30% of the Eddington limit.

Analyses of 2,658 whole genomes across 38 types of cancer identify the contribution of non-coding point mutations and structural variants to driving cancer.

In somatic cells the mechanisms maintaining the chromosome ends are normally inactivated; however, cancer cells can re-activate these pathways to support continuous growth. Here, the authors characterize the telomeric landscapes across tumour types and identify genomic alterations associated with different telomere maintenance mechanisms.

Whole-genome sequencing data from more than 2,500 cancers of 38 tumour types reveal 16 signatures that can be used to classify somatic structural variants, highlighting the diversity of genomic rearrangements in cancer.

A pan-cancer genomic analysis reports the effects of structural variations on chromatin domains (TADs). Most TAD disruptions do not result in appreciable changes in expression of nearby genes.

An analysis of 2,954 genomes from 38 cancer subtypes identified 19,166 retrotransposition events in 35% of samples. Aberrant LINE-1 retrotranspositions can lead to the deletion of tumor-suppressor genes as well as the amplification of oncogenes.

In this study the authors consider the structural variants (SVs) present within cancer cases of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium. They report hundreds of genes, including known cancer-associated genes for which the nearby presence of a SV breakpoint is associated with altered expression.

A lensed quasar at redshift z ≈ 10.3, seen in X-rays, hosts a supermassive black hole of mass similar to that of its host galaxy. The large black-hole mass at a young age, as well as the amount of X-rays it produces, suggest that the black hole formed from the collapse of a huge cloud of gas.

Quantifying Greenland's future contribution to sea level requires accurate portrayal of its outlet glaciers in ice sheet simulations. Here, the authors show that outlet glacier flow can be captured if ice thickness is well constrained and vertical shearing as well as membrane stresses are included in the model.

A global network of researchers was formed to investigate the role of human genetics in SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 severity; this paper reports 13 genome-wide significant loci and potentially actionable mechanisms in response to infection.

Charlie Clutterbuck, Alan Dalton and Andy Solandt, of the British Society for Social Responsibility in Science, consider what action needs to be taken to identify and regulate industrial health hazards.

Genome-wide ancient DNA data from individuals from the Middle Bronze Age to Iron Age documents large-scale movement of people from the European continent between 1300 and 800 bc that was probably responsible for spreading early Celtic languages to Britain.

Allogenic mesenchymal stem cells are engineered with three mRNAs to bind to multiple myeloma B cells while activating T cells for cancer therapy.

The number of individuals in a given space influences animal interactions and network dynamics. Here the authors identify general rules underlying density dependence in animal networks and reveal some fundamental differences between spatial and social dynamics.

Understanding deregulation of biological pathways in cancer can provide insight into disease etiology and potential therapies. Here, as part of the PanCancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) consortium, the authors present pathway and network analysis of 2583 whole cancer genomes from 27 tumour types.

There’s an emerging body of evidence to show how biological sex impacts cancer incidence, treatment and underlying biology. Here, using a large pan-cancer dataset, the authors further highlight how sex differences shape the cancer genome.

With the generation of large pan-cancer whole-exome and whole-genome sequencing projects, a question remains about how comparable these datasets are. Here, using The Cancer Genome Atlas samples analysed as part of the Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes project, the authors explore the concordance of mutations called by whole exome sequencing and whole genome sequencing techniques.

Integrative analyses of transcriptome and whole-genome sequencing data for 1,188 tumours across 27 types of cancer are used to provide a comprehensive catalogue of RNA-level alterations in cancer.

Viral pathogen load in cancer genomes is estimated through analysis of sequencing data from 2,656 tumors across 35 cancer types using multiple pathogen-detection pipelines, identifying viruses in 382 genomic and 68 transcriptome datasets.

Analysis of cancer genome sequencing data has enabled the discovery of driver mutations. Here, as part of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium the authors present DriverPower, a software package that identifies coding and non-coding driver mutations within cancer whole genomes via consideration of mutational burden and functional impact evidence.

Whole-genome sequencing data for 2,778 cancer samples from 2,658 unique donors across 38 cancer types is used to reconstruct the evolutionary history of cancer, revealing that driver mutations can precede diagnosis by several years to decades.

Some cancer patients first present with metastases where the location of the primary is unidentified; these are difficult to treat. In this study, using machine learning, the authors develop a method to determine the tissue of origin of a cancer based on whole sequencing data.

The authors present SVclone, a computational method for inferring the cancer cell fraction of structural variants from whole-genome sequencing data.

Many tumours exhibit hypoxia (low oxygen) and hypoxic tumours often respond poorly to therapy. Here, the authors quantify hypoxia in 1188 tumours from 27 cancer types, showing elevated hypoxia links to increased mutational load, directing evolutionary trajectories.